Regular Mechanics
by Autumn Win-Dow
Summary: Hotaru survives on black coffee, as she creates a rigid schedule which after a year defines her life. But one small intrusion from her former lover makes everything crash down, including herself. #80


**_Regular Mechanics_**

**by Autumn Win-dow**

* * *

Hotaru liked her coffee black, with a spoonful of sugar. It was a hot and bitter drink to wake her up in the mornings, left no chance to indulge or grow lethargic, and only gave her the absolute energy to resume her daily mechanics.

The coffee was her petrol. She lived on the substance, and though the excessive consumption was terrible for her health, her determination to stay with her regular mechanics never allowed her to give in to even her most rational thoughts.

Even when her best friend Mikan would often visit her workplace with a carefully crafted and fulfilling bento, Hotaru would usually let the brunette eat most of it unconsciously as she edited her blueprints, for both the new plane and her regular mechanics.

After arriving to work, Hotaru would spend an hour reading her e-mails from those in charge, and it was simply business that she was urged to follow their somewhat unreasonable directions. In fact, when they seemed unrealistic to her co-workers, Hotaru never saw a bother to them. She did not believe that what was being called unreasonable was really a bother to do, nor did it endanger her life. Knowing those who complained in her presence were rather talkative people who often procrastinated after spending hours laughing at cat pictures on the internet, she believed that it was evident that their own social lives were disrupting their work lives.

Hotaru knew that a social life would simply disrupt the regular mechanics.

She remembered the last time when her life was considered remotely 'social'-it was a year ago, and she had no intention to return to her former life.

Hotaru had business to attend to, after all.

After the reading of her e-mails, she would then get to work with the direction of construction.

As a flight engineer, she was often in charge of leading conferences and meetings about the features and mechanics of the new airplane or helicopter. Hotaru would speak with a cool power, unwilling to put up with the occasional trifle or giggle, following a set of concrete steps in its conduction.

Hotaru always made rules for herself, and not once since a year ago did she ever disobey them.

The problem had not come back to haunt her as of yet, and she was simply strengthening her mechanics and resolve in preparation for when it would arise.

She never expected it to be so soon, yet she would scold herself for not expecting it-he was the chief executive officer of the company she worked for, after all.

Hotaru was unwilling to let him disrupt her regular mechanics. She would drink her coffee-black, one sugar-read her e-mails, plan the construction, get to work.

Unfortunately for Hotaru, the subject of her problems and rigid lifestyle was not willing to let her do as she pleased.

* * *

As she walked to the kitchen to pour herself the usual coffee, the door bell curiously rang.

"Hello, Hotaru." A gentle voice speaks as soon as she opens the door.

She pulled her bath robe tighter around her body.

"What are you doing here, Chairman?" Hotaru coldly asked, hiding her anxiousness behind the mask she had formed within the year.

"You're still calling me that?" The blonde nervously murmured, scratching the back of his head nervously. "So, we're not exactly able to repair what's happened, I'm presuming."

She scoffed. "What's been broken can't be fixed. It's a popular saying,_ Ruka_, and you should look it up."

"But you know that isn't true, Hotaru." His blue eyes plead to her, and her grip tightens on the sash of her robe. "That's what a female protagonist of a soap opera would say, and I know how much you hate those types of characters. So why are you sounding like one?"

Hotaru realized that he was right. She was sounding like a completely dependent, selfish, reliant female lead, when she had placed all of her efforts to be everything otherwise.

It was why she started her regular mechanics.

"I have to get ready for work." She chose to reply monotonously. "And I believe that you have a job to return to, as well."

Ruka gently smiled as he looked down at the pavement. "I'm fine with not restarting what was between us a year ago, but that doesn't change the fact that you know me more than anyone else, including the fact that you know I hate my job."

The engineer did not reply.

The blonde decided to step forward, knowing that Hotaru was not the type of person to back away at such an instance.

"And it seems you forgot that it wasn't me who broke it off. I would never have broken it off. And," he pulled her chin and placed a gentle kiss on her cheek and he mutters, "I'll still be waiting despite that."

With another smile which resembled the one which made her different a year ago, he turned and walked down the pathway, as she watched his back.

Hotaru was not going to chase him. It would simply disrupt her regular mechanics, the mechanics which she had delicately crafted for her own benefit and had followed for a year. She was not willing to change that because of a brief encounter with her former lover.

A kiss would not stir her.

* * *

Hotaru did not have the time to drink her usual coffee, and as strange as it sounded, her day was completely dependent on that missing beverage.

Her co-workers had been shocked to their wits when they saw Hotaru act even the slightest disorganized. She had not been able to edit all of the blueprints within an hour, and she was slightly late to the conference with only half of the suggestions she usually brought in. Although it did not seem to be that different to her usual routine sans a little slip up in the morning, it was surely significant to Hotaru's wellbeing and mind.

The constant consumption of coffee had helped her maintain her energy, but missing out on the coffee that morning influenced the sugar crash she experienced after the conference.

Usually, when she missed out on drinking her usual coffee, the crash would not be so destructive to her body.

Hotaru knew that what she was thinking was certainly one of the end results to her year establishing her regular mechanics, to create a rigid routine which she would continually follow to remain on her feet, to have no time to deal with people and their problems, especially his own-more than often relating to her.

But she did not expect her regular mechanics to fail.

The mechanics jammed from an external intrusion, an extra addition which was in fact a part of the machine the whole time, but had been forcibly removed leaning the gears to work on their own. After the jam, it would realize that this missing piece was finally back, and it instantly reverted back to their old mechanics, completely forgetting how to conduct the new, regular mechanics.

Why on earth could she not forget about the feeling on her cheek that day, and the day after, and the day _after_?

She sat herself on the edge of her bed, exasperated. Hotaru can no longer handle the fleeting images in her head. She picks up her phone, in resignation and resolve,and taps in a very familiar number.

They answer after the first ring. "_...Hotaru?"_

_"_You owe me a coffee after that stunt of yours on Monday."

"_Wait- why?_"

"I'm not calling you just because of coffee, you idiot." Hotaru cannot help but smile at how it ended.

The mechanics have collapsed.


End file.
